It’s Time To Give Bring-Your-Own-Device A Chance

Whether or not your employees have ever used their own devices for work before, this is a good time to think about letting them do so. Here’s why. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has strained tech infrastructures worldwide for many reasons. One of the biggest is that company-owned devices may not be available when employees work from home. Companies now have to face a choice of asking their workers to use their own devices (known as bring-your-own-device, or BYOD), or simply not working at all. 

This is unwelcome news for many companies, who are afraid to ask employees to use their own devices. If left to their own devices, workers have less accountability- for example, they could send business emails to anyone outside the organization. Companies can raise accountability by asking workers to check in and show them how they are using their devices- but this could potentially be a major privacy violation. 

Luckily, there are remote tech solutions that companies can employ to let workers safely use their own devices. Even for the most safety-minded organization, it’s time to think about adopting BYOD.

SureMDM by 42Gears offers a handful of features that ensure businesses can implement BYOD policies safely. Let’s a look at those features, and how you can get started with implementing BYOD policies right away. 

Containerization

MDM solutions like SureMDM allow you to create a virtual container on an employee device. This means that you can manage a part of a worker’s device, keep all business data in that part, and hold that part to the same security standards as company-owned devices. Because the container is a discrete section of the device, device owners don’t have to worry about IT admins overstepping their boundaries and accessing workers’ personal information. 

What exactly does containerization look like in action? Imagine an employee copy-pasting data from a work app to a personal app by accident, and including it as part of a personal email. This wouldn’t happen with a virtual container, as the device would simply refuse to paste text from inside the container anywhere else on the device. 

Containerization also helps in the event that admins need to erase all business data from a device- because of the employee leaving the company, losing the device, or engaging in unsafe behavior with the device. Admins can erase all business data without impacting personal data in any way. Given that the circumstances that would lead to this erasure would be stressful as-is, admins will be relieved to know that they can secure liabilities at a moment’s notice. 

Device Password Protection

Although the virtual container can be password protected, SureMDM lets admins add another layer of security by password-protecting the device. SureMDM also lets admins set minimum password standards, in terms of length and the variety of characters used.

Mobile Email Management

Protecting company emails is an essential component of protecting company security. SureMDM’s mobile email management tools help you to ensure emails cannot be compromised. You can ensure that employees can only open work emails in your chosen email agent. 

Conclusion

Many companies want to own every piece of hardware their employees need for work- but this can be difficult or impossible during extended work-from-home periods. 

SureMDM makes BYOD possible. By creating a secure container on the device, admins can protect confidential emails, text, and much more, while mandating a strong device password. 

If you would like to learn more about SureMDM, please visit this link. To register for a free trial, please click here.